


Nine Tenths

by solomonara



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, Don't copy to another site, Fantasizing, Get together fic, Humor, M/M, Non-Consensual Touching, Restraints, Sort of seriously anyway, Swearing, dubious Latin, jaydick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-18
Updated: 2019-05-18
Packaged: 2020-03-07 04:24:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18865654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solomonara/pseuds/solomonara
Summary: A week ago, Nightwing stepped in to help Zatanna and Constantine out with a rogue magic user. Now Dick's acting a little… strange. But Jason's the only one in a position to notice.





	Nine Tenths

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to die as just a silly idea never destined to become an actual fic, but then Certain People (you know who you are) encouraged it. So thank you, jaydick friends. This is all your fault.
> 
> Thank you, as always, to my excellent beta reader, [ DragonSorceress22](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonSorceress22), for consistently preventing me from indulging the 19th century British author who has apparently taken up residence inside my brain and who would very much prefer that all of my sentences be at least as long as this one has been and who sometimes takes control of my spelling and word choice.

"You fools!" screamed the old man, and Nightwing grinned. When they started yelling stuff like that, it was a decent sign the good guys were winning.

"You say that, but you're the one out here summoning demons. Did they change the definition of fool when I wasn't looking?" he asked, cartwheeling out of the way of a random energy discharge.

"Less chatter more getting your arse out of here," Constantine growled. "We can't hold this forever." He and Zatanna had flanked the would-be wizard and were holding a protective shield keeping him – and the magical energies he was failing to control – contained. Mostly.

"And leave you two to fend for yourselves? You clearly need another pair of hands," Nightwing said.

"If you're staying, make yourself useful," Zatanna said through gritted teeth. "Get the reliquary."

Nightwing frowned. "The glowy green thing?"

"That's the one," she said. "Constantine, he's shifting." She sounded remarkably calm for someone who was having to oscillate a magical shield to keep it in tune with the fluctuating energies the man was summoning. That was okay; Constantine was swearing enough for both of them.

"The glowy green thing _inside_ the protective circle, behind your shields, around this guy's neck?" Dick clarified.

"You got it, bright eyes."

"O…kay. Give me a minute."

"I'll give you ten seconds, and then a one-second window. Got that, Constantine?" she yelled over the sudden howl of wind inside the shield. The old man had flung his arms into the air and was screaming.

"Oh, sure," Constantine said. "No problem. Let me just synchronize my watch."

Nightwing backflipped away from a snake of orange lightning that had punched its way out, then kept going, bounding up a stack of boxes near the wall of the storage room they were currently voiding the security deposit on. From there he vaulted into the exposed rafters and readied a line.

"Ready?" Zatanna called.

"Always!"

"Three… two…"

Nightwing shoved off from the rafter, arms spread, line in one hand, building the momentum he'd need to make the swing as quick as he could.

"One!"

The shield popped like a soap bubble. Nightwing passed through the air where it had been so quickly after it dropped that he thought he'd felt just the slightest resistance. He grabbed the glowy green thing from around the guy's neck as he swung past – the chain snapped easily – and let go of the line to send himself somersaulting through the air. He landed in a crouch on another pile of boxes on the opposite side of the room. A blade of green energy followed him and Zatanna and Constantine snapped the shield back into place, bisecting it.

There was an explosion.

* * *

  
He opened his eyes.

His hand hurt.

He had a hand. That was a good sign. Legs, too. They were nice legs, it looked like.

"Don't freak out," said a woman's voice. Zatanna, his brain supplied. Oh, brain. Very nice. Seemed responsive, and that always helped.

"Okay," he said tentatively. He sat up. Zatanna and… Constantine (thanks, brain) were blocking his view of the rest of the room and he resisted the urge to scoot away from them. They didn't look mad, or aggressive. _Friends_. "Why would I freak out?"

"Our wizard friend got himself a bit dead," Constantine said. He'd lit a cigarette so the fight was definitely over.

"Oh," Nightwing ( _Nightwing_. Good name. He'd keep it.) said. That was bad. "That's bad."

"Well, in the grand scheme of things, maybe not so much," Constantine said with a shrug. Nightwing's face knew what to do with a statement like that, so he let it. Constantine rolled his eyes. "Relax, this one's not on you. Would appreciate a head start before you run and tell the big bat, though."

"What about… whatever he was doing?" Nightwing asked.

Zatanna nudged a molten lump of no-longer-glowing-green glass and metal with her toe. "Died with him, seems like." She eyed the runes scrawled on the floor behind them. "Things summoned like this usually can't survive outside their own planes without their designated vessels. Though, we still need to figure out exactly what this guy was pulling, where it was coming from, and why."

"So, thanks for the assist, always lovely to see the bats poking their shapely noses where they don't belong. If you'll kindly piss off, the adults will wrap this up." Constantine dropped the cigarette and stubbed it out.

"Hey, I'm not the one who interrupted a magic current and fried a wizard," Nightwing snapped, getting to his feet. He could see the wizard's body. The eyes were still smoking.

"Sort-of wizard," Zatanna said.

"Does that make it better?"

"Wouldn't have happened if it was a wizard who knew what he was doing," she said with a shrug.

"Great. Good. Well you two have fun with this, then. And hey, _warn_ a guy next time you're going to be crashing a séance in his city. Then maybe I won't have to just luckily stumble in right when you need me," he said.

Zatanna sighed. "It was a last minute thing."

"Here's an idea," Constantine said. "Next time, how about you luckily stumble somewhere else and let the magic experts handle the magic."

"You're welcome," Nightwing said. His body knew what to do. He fired a grapple up to the rafters and let himself out through a skylight.

Magic experts, maybe. But they didn't know everything.

 

_One Week Later_

Jason jammed the helmet onto his head – a normal motorcycle helmet, _not_ the hood, because he was _supposed_ to be here as Bruce Wayne's estranged son, not as a vigilante. He should have known Bruce wouldn't be able to keep the two separate for long.

Jason had only started coming to the occasional Friday dinner because Alfred had asked (gently, exactly once, without ever bringing it up again) and mostly it had been okay: dinner, and that was it. Jason was under no obligation to stay or even to come regularly.

But this time Bruce had started handing out orders _at the table_. Sure, it wasn't during dinner. Alfred would have skinned him. It was clear, though, that he'd wanted to catch the whole family, including Jason, together in order to brief them on an upcoming Justice League mission that would have him off-planet and require some schedule juggling from the rest of the bats. That kind of thing belonged in the Cave, and Jason didn't appreciate the ambush. Especially since he'd thought Bruce understood that he was doing his own thing: he was playing by the rules, _yes_ , but he was not Bruce's to order around.

"Hey, Jay," Dick called, hurrying over, shoes crunching on the gravel. Jason debated kicking his bike into gear and peeling out of there to make him leap out of the way, but instead pulled off the helmet with a sigh and dismounted.

"Come with more orders from on high?" he asked, crossing his arms. A lecture on storming out from the golden child was not what he needed right now, but he also thought he might punch Dick in his stupid perfect face if he tried to apologize on Bruce's behalf. Pretty much there was nothing Dick could say right now that would make Jason happy to see him and, if he was honest with himself, he was sort of relishing his annoyance. He could do with a bit of a fight, work off some aggression, and no one matched him like Dick did.

"Yeah, right. I just didn't want you to leave without getting you to myself for a second," Dick said, slowing to a stop in front of Jason.

Oh? That was interesting. Something Dick wanted to say to him in private? Without Bats knowing? "I'm all ears," Jason said.

"Not the part I'm looking for." And then Dick's lips were on his, a kiss stolen swiftly but definitely, one that left Jason blinking in stunned shock. Dick smiled at him and cupped his cheek with one hand. "God, you're cute. I've missed you lately, little wing, and I'll be in town the whole time Bruce is away." He leaned in again, lips close to Jason's ear. "Come find me out there," he said, his voice low. Then he turned and walked back into the house like nothing had happened.

Jason shut his mouth.

He debated shooting Dick.

Then he downgraded it to tackling him and holding him down until he fucking explained himself.

 _Then_ he remembered the house full of bats that would likely not take kindly to Jason attacking Dick, and he _definitely_ didn't want to explain what had just happened because it would probably, somehow, be his fault.

So he put the helmet back on, got on his bike, and left.

 

Jason's first stop was the safehouse with the secure line into the Batcomputer. He checked all of Dick's mission reports from the past few days but there was no documentation of a head injury or exposure to any toxins. None of the others had reported any strange behavior from him and he'd been filing reports as usual: sporadically, when he felt like it. He'd be more thorough if he was working Gotham, but when he was on his own in Bludhaven he didn't feel the need to report in unless it was something major.

Could be something recent, then. Jason sat back in his chair and chewed a thumbnail. Dick had seemed completely normal at dinner. What he'd done after had been… strange, yes, but not exactly in line with symptoms from any of the various venoms, toxins, or gasses they might encounter in the field. So that was at the bottom of the list.

Knock to the head, maybe, but something severe enough to cause a behavioral change like that, to make Dick Grayson come onto him… no. Someone would have noticed the injury. He'd have been off the streets for a while after the kind of hit that would have taken.

So maybe it wasn't what it looked like. Magic? Brain-washing? Jason couldn't think of anyone who'd benefit from puppetting Dick into making a pass at him. Maybe it wasn't a come-on. Maybe it was a threat. Or bait. _Come find me,_ he'd said. Jason would, but only when he was good and ready.

 

It ended up being Nightwing who found Red Hood first, though, ruling out Jason's concerns about a trap and replacing them very quickly with a number of other urgent concerns, top-most on the list being that Nightwing apparently thought that creeping up behind Jason where he was crouched on a roof-top stakeout and giving his ass a fond squeeze was a good way to say hello.

And now Nightwing had a gun pointed at his face and his hands raised, but he was still _smirking_ , and yes, that smirk was one hundred percent Dick.

"Just me, little wing," Nightwing said.

Jason didn't lower the gun. "Personal space, _dick_ ," he snarled.

Dick's smile faded, though it didn't disappear. "Oh, right. I shouldn't have touched you without warning."

"The warning isn't the issue here," Jason said. He jammed the gun back in its holster because really, it wasn't like he was going to shoot Dick in the face and both of them knew it.

"Are you mad at me?" Nightwing asked, head cocked like he was trying to remember something.

"Kinda!"

"I'm sorry," he said. He stepped closer, the movement fluid, every ounce of Dick's grace evident. "Let me make it up to you. Whatever you want."

Alarm bells were ringing in Jason's head, and his skin was tingling like a fire that itched. His body was trying to tell him something. He needed time to parse that, and preferably a little distance. "What… exactly are you sorry for?" he asked.

Nightwing sighed. "Well to be perfectly honest, I think I've been kind of a shit boyfriend. But that all changes now."

Jason did not hear the second sentence. His brain had run up against the end of the first one and flattened itself, Wile E. Coyote style, on the word _boyfriend._

He was saved stammering through a confused response by the sharp sound of a car door closing and the reminder that he was supposed to be on a stakeout right now.

"Fuck. I need to—"

"Go save the day," Nightwing said with a grin. "Want an assist?"

"No!"

Nightwing held up his hands. "I know, I know. You're a strong, independent vigilante who don't need no man." He leaned in and pecked Jason's helmet on the cheek. Jason only just managed to turn his backward stumble into a somewhat professional-looking dive off the building, swinging off into the night.

 

Boyfriend. _Boyfriend_?! Jason was pretty damn sure he'd know if he and Dick were dating. They didn't even _speak_ that often, let alone… anything else! Something was very, very wrong here. Had he fallen into an alternate universe without noticing? Had _Dick_? Time travel? (That was the optimist in him, maybe.) Whatever was going on, Jason intended to find out.

So after making sure he had a tracker on the small-time mob enforcer he'd been watching (foothold into bigger fish, could sit on the back burner for now), Jason angled his way across the city to the penthouse where Dick would be staying while he was in town during Bruce's little excursion.

On the way he called Oracle, just in case. It was always possible everyone already knew something was up and had just neglected to tell him.

"Hood. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"It's N. Any reports of him acting… weird?"

A few mechanized clicks. Babs didn't use an actual mouse or keyboard, but she'd programmed the sounds into her rig because she liked them. "Nope," she said. "Weird how?"

"Uh. He seemed a little… confused, earlier tonight." _And handsy._

"Think he got hit with something? Scarecrow's off the board. Ivy's on parole, but she's been quiet."

"No, it doesn't seem like anything we know of," Jason said.

"Details, Hood. What's going on?"

 _He kissed me and grabbed my ass_. Jason felt his face heating. Nope, no way he was telling Babs this. "Nothing. Probably just N being N. Never mind."

That earned him an annoyed huff over the line. "Fine. Let me know if anything changes. O out." She cut the call. Jason was absolutely certain the other bats would be getting calls about this, just in case Jason was hiding something about Nightwing. Well, good. They should probably be alert and this would take care of that without Jason having to share anything embarrassing.

He circumvented the penthouse cameras and broke in because this was officially an investigation. Dick would still be out for the night, and Jason was hoping he'd stay that way for a good while.

Nothing looked out of place; there was food in the fridge, the bat-bunker was secured with the proper protocols, the shoes by the door were Dick's. It took Jason five minutes of prowling around to notice that he hadn't tripped over any clothes left tossed on the floor.

It wasn't that Dick was messy. Not exactly. He generally didn't have enough stuff to _be_ messy. He just had a casual approach to dusting, tended to leave clothing draped on furniture (where it would eventually fall to the ground), kicked his socks off in the middle of the room and left them there, and never, ever made his bed.

Jason poked his head into the bedroom. This bed was made. There were no socks. The clothes were in the closet. Well, Dick had only been in the penthouse a day or two… but still. Odd.

Jason was searching for a computer when goosebumps started pricking down his arms. It was similar to the feeling he'd had on the rooftop earlier that night and, on a hunch, he slipped into the bedroom Dick was using and slid under the bed. He barely fit; the bed was close to the ground, but that was good. It'd make it much harder for Dick to notice him. And if he did, Jason could just say he'd intended to… surprise his boyfriend. Yeah.

Sure enough, he heard the secret elevator doors close and a few moments later the light in the room flicked on. Dick's bare feet walked right past Jason's nose. A pair of sweats and a t-shirt hit the floor and were immediately scooped up and dropped into a laundry basket. Dick went into the master bathroom and Jason heard the shower running a moment later.

Jason waited a little while longer to make sure Dick was actually in the shower, skin prickling the whole time. He knew what that was, now that he had a chance to pay attention to it, and it was not good.

The All-Blades were calling and Jason officially needed a better plan than "hide under the bed."

* * *

  
Dick hummed as he dried off from the shower. He was in a spectacular mood. A week ago, he – the thing that was currently calling itself Dick – had been certain he was going to die. That idiot magic user had altered the summoning ritual. From what Dick could tell, the so-called wizard had probably been trying to call a demon and absorb its power. The moron had sort of home-brewed the ritual, though, and things had gone pretty spectacularly wrong even before the heroes had shown up. If they hadn't interfered, the wizard _and_ the thing he'd summoned would have died.

Instead, Dick – not as good a name as Nightwing, but it was convenient to keep it – now had a killer body, got to go out every night and scare the shit out of humans, and was dating a human that made the aforementioned killer body feel all sorts of fun, tingly things.

Mm, Jason. That had been a tough nut to crack. Nightwing's brain gave him surface information easily, and his muscle memory was pretty perfect, but it took a little doing to get to the deeper stuff. There were at least four different identities in there all twisting together to make the true person he'd taken over, but sometimes only one or another of them needed to be pulled out at a time depending on the situation. Needlessly complicated, in his opinion.

Still, he'd figured most of it out within a few days. But everything having to do with Jason Todd was locked away so deep that Dick hadn't even realized there was something to know until he'd seen Jason at dinner on Friday. (Dinner! There was another thing to love about his present situation. The thing currently being Dick was from what the humans called a hell dimension, and he had to say he agreed with the assessment. They didn't have things like Alfreds, or food, and he'd have kept up the Dick Grayson mask for those alone.)

Jason had gotten up at one point during the meal and leaned over the table to grab something and Dick had had a sudden, _vivid_ picture of shoving him down on the table and… enjoying dessert.

He'd quickly chased the thought to a veritable treasure trove of tucked away memories of Jason: sparring together with strikes glancing off of sweat-slick skin; watching him scale a building, powerful legs propelling him from dumpster to fire escape to window ledge to roof; fighting a group of enemies with him, their backs to each other, Jason's presence a solid comfort before they both exploded into satisfying action. And with each, that pleasant, tingling rush of attraction. Of _lust_.

Even further behind those memories were a thousand images of taking Jason's hand when he least expected it; of grabbing his face and kissing him the way he deserved to be kissed, hot and fierce and with all of his attention; of turning that attention elsewhere, lower, and making Jason _scream_ …

Those ones were all a little hazy, and Dick suspected that his body's original inhabitant was still in there somewhere, guarding the thing he loved most, maybe. Trying to keep anyone from seeing those thoughts. He and Jason were certainly keeping the relationship secret from everyone else. Why, Jason hadn't looked twice at him during dinner, and that was probably why these thoughts about Jason were buried so deep; Dick wouldn't want to let on to the rest of the family. With the contentious relationship they all shared, the current Dick couldn't blame his past self.

And Dick knew himself by now, knew the person who had _been_ Dick would never do those things he'd seen in his brain with someone he hadn't established a romantic relationship with. The guy was a serial monogamist. And now Dick was in a position of having neglected his apparent boyfriend for a week because he hadn't _known_. From what he could see of Dick's memories, they were a long-distance couple, sort of. Bludhaven wasn't that far, but they were both busy…

Well, no more of that. Jason Todd, that beautiful, violent man, deserved much more than he'd been getting and Dick was going to make sure he got it. No more of that slight flavor of shame that lingered around the old Dick's thoughts about Jason, which had to be because of his family's prudish aversion to killing. (Though Dick had, of course, been following the rules himself; he had it good here and wasn't ready to tip anyone off.) Maybe, given enough time and enough tiny, incremental changes, he and Jason could go off in the world on their own, be their true selves…

Dick shook himself from his fantasy. That was something else he was getting used to: humans fantasized so strongly it could seem real, and he had to be careful not to get caught up.

He tossed his towel toward the bed, but it slithered off to the floor. He tugged on some comfortable sweats and bent to retrieve it, noting with a pleased glance while he was down there that the floor was still fairly dust-free, even under the bed. It was the one major change he'd made to Dick Grayson's life: the place where he lived was going to be _clean_. He'd lived his entire existence in a hell pit; he certainly wasn't going to recreate those conditions here.

Now, then. He was clean, his home was clean, and he had taken steps to fixing up his relationship.

"Are you watching, Dick Grayson?" he murmured. "I'm living your life better than you did. Really, you're lucky I came along. And so is Jason Todd."

* * *

  
Jason still didn't know exactly what was going on with Dick, but at least now he was prepared. In fact, in true bat fashion, he was prepared for multiple things. He had it pretty much narrowed down to doppelganger (of the magical sort) or possession, but those were two very different problems with very different solutions.

For now, he was ignoring the clamoring of the All-Blades. Sure, if it was a doppelganger he could just chop its head off, simple enough. If it was possession, well, beheading would fix that too, but it might also fix Dick in a sort of permanent way and Jason wasn't really up for that. So he had hit the local black market magic shops and stocked up. He'd memorized a few precautions of both the holy and magical kind. He was ready.

He just… wasn't sure what to do next.

That wasn't quite true. He knew that the next step _should_ be to lure Dick back to this safe house and get him into a controlled environment and then test a few things. He even had a good idea of how to lure him back here since whatever this thing was had somehow gotten the idea that they were _dating_. He just. Didn't want to use his body as bait.

It wouldn't even be the most dangerous thing he'd ever done, he reasoned. It would be easy. It would be _really_ easy.

Maybe he should call Babs.

His com chimed and he snatched it off the table, jamming it in his ear.

"Hood?" came Dick's voice.

 _Speak of the devil. Maybe literally_. "Yeah?" Jason asked warily.

"Are you out tonight?" Dick asked, his voice playful. "I thought we might find a nice robbery or pick a fight with a gang."

Jason took a deep breath. He could do this. "No, I thought I'd stay in, actually. I'm at the Lake Street safehouse."

"Are you okay?"

God damn, that sounded like real concern. What the fuck. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm good. I was thinking—" _Just do it, you coward._ "You said whatever I want, right?" he asked, mimicking the way Dick had dropped his voice last night. It had worked well enough on _him_ , after all.

There was a pause. "Yes," Dick purred. "Yes I did. What do you want, Red Hood?"

"You. Here. Now."

"Yes, sir," Dick said and Jason could just picture the grin on his face. He cut the com and tossed it back onto the table, resuming his pacing.

This was fine. This would work. Everything was in the bedroom. He could just tell Dick he wanted to engage in a little light bondage and once he was restrained Jason could set up the rituals he needed to figure out exactly what was happening.

Jason would just have to keep his cool while doing that. Act like he tied up sex partners all the time. In iron chains.

Oh, God, this was a _stupid_ plan, what was he _thinking_. What if Dick didn't even _like_ being tied up – okay, no that probably wasn't going to be the issue here, really – but what if—

The window slid open behind him and Jason whirled. Dick, in full Nightwing costume, slid over the sill and shut it behind him.

"So," Dick said, after he'd pulled the curtains closed. "Ready to forgive me?" He stalked across the room to Jason. Jason forced himself not to take a step backward.

"Yeah," Jason said. The dryness in his throat made his voice rougher, but he was fairly certain that was a sexy thing and didn't sound at all like nervousness. "Let's—"

Dick pounced on him, his mouth sealing over Jason's while both hands snarled in his hair and pulled him closer. Jason's lips parted in self-defense and Dick did exactly what one might be expected to do when presented with that opportunity.

Jason caught a moan before it could escape his throat, but he was pretty sure Dick tasted it anyway, close as he was. The static cling of the All-Blades waiting to be summoned fizzled along his skin. He probably shouldn't be enjoying the sensation as much as he was and he turned his head away, drawing in a harsh breath.

Dick just moved to his neck.

"Oh, fuck," Jason said, squeezing his eyes shut, casting about for— what was it?

"Yes, let's," Dick whispered to his skin.

" _Quae mando tibi serpentum,_ " Jason gasped. Dick paused, one hand moving to the back of Jason's neck.

"Jason?"

" _In nomine iudex vivorum_ ," Jason went on quickly. " _Et mortuorum—_ " Dick started laughing, his breath tickling Jason's ear. "Oh, fuck it," Jason said, and summoned the All-Blades.

* * *

  
He opened his eyes.

"Ow," Dick said, in case anyone friendly was listening. He was on his back in a bed. That was nice. He also had manacles around his wrists holding his arms out to either side. Ankles, too. Less nice.

"Dick?"

Dick wiggled his nose. No mask. No suit, either, he noticed. No… anything. Hoo, boy. Jason's face interrupted his view of the ceiling. Ah. It was safe to be Dick, then, yes. "Yeah?"

"Is that you in there?"

"If we're in the sort of situation where you have to ask that, you probably shouldn't believe me even if I say yes. But yes," Dick said. He gave his arms an experimental tug. Chains rattled and Jason tensed. Dick could smell recently-extinguished candles. "Why am I chained naked to your bed? It _is_ your bed, right?" Dick asked, suddenly very concerned. "This isn't a rescued-from-a-sex-ritual thing, is it?"

"It's my bed," Jason confirmed. "It's also a rescue. A rescue ritual. No sex involved. And I would have left you your underwear but _guess what_ you weren't wearing any."

"Then why are you the one who's blushing? What—" It all came rushing back, like remembering last night's dream halfway through the day. "Oh. _Oh_." He thumped his head back on the pillow, which, he thought, was very thoughtful of Jason to have put there while he was _exorcising him_.

"You remember?"

"I come onto you and your first thought is I must be possessed?" The memories were soft, fuzzy, already fading, but he thought he had the highlights. The thing riding him hadn't actually done anything too terrible. It had been _really_ good at being him. Except…

"You _were_ possessed!"

"You need to work on your self-esteem. I don't need a demon to flirt with you, Jay, have you seen yourself?" Dick asked wearily.

"What?"

"What?"

Jason narrowed his eyes at Dick, then slowly reached behind himself to grab a flask off a small table. He upended it over Dick's face.

"Hey!" Dick protested, and got a mouthful of… water? Oh, gross, holy water. It was just slightly oily. He gave Jason an unimpressed look and spat a small stream of water at him. "Self-esteem issues."

Jason sighed and sat on the edge of the bed and put his face in his hands.

"Hey. You okay?" Dick asked. His toes were getting kind of cold.

"Why did it think we were dating, Dick?" Jason asked.

Dick squirmed a little in the chains. "Can you maybe let me out before we do a post-mortem?"

Jason turned to him and considered. "No," he said. "No, I don't think I can."

"You don't still think I'm—"

"No," Jason said. "But I don't want you diving out a window before I get answers, Dick."

"It's private."

Jason glared. "Your ride-along buddy spent the last three days groping me whenever he got a chance, Dick. I had to fucking go along with it last night to get it in a spot where I could exorcise it. I want answers."

"I'm sorry," Dick said. "He shouldn't have— I would never have—"

"It told me," Jason interrupted. "Said a lot of things while I was figuring out how to get it gone once I had it tied up here. Offered me a lot of things. And it told me why it thought what it thought. I want to know if it was lying."

Dick held Jason's stare for several seconds. "I'll tell you," he said finally. "But not tied down and naked."

"If you run—"

"I won't. Promise."

Jason went to the same table he'd taken the holy water from and got the manacle key. He unlocked Dick's feet first, then his hands. Dick sat up as soon as he could and pulled his feet up so he could wrap his hands around his toes.

Jason turned away from him and went to his dresser, taking a little longer than he had to to find a pair of sweatpants. Dick saw his Nightwing suit crumpled in a corner, along with his boots and his weapons. He could grab them and be gone in seconds. Jason knew that. Dick waited for him to turn back. When he did, it was to throw an obnoxiously yellow pair of pants at Dick.

Dick shinnied into them. They were soft and long enough to cover his feet. While he was doing that, a Neon Knights t-shirt hit him in the face, so he put that on too and then sat cross-legged in the middle of the bed. Jason stayed standing, arms crossed, leaning against the wall.

"It saw some things in my head and assumed," Dick said. The look on Jason's face told him that wasn't good enough. "All right. It looked at some of my memories, and the feelings associated with them, and made its assumption based on that. And." Dick inhaled slowly. He might as well come clean, all the way. It felt very wrong to lie to Jason about this, even by omission, after what he'd just done to help Dick. "It may have mistaken some… thoughts… for memories."

"Thoughts," Jason said flatly.

"About you."

"Fantasies," Jason confirmed.

Dick could feel his face heating now. He dropped his head. "Yeah. Sorry."

The bed dipped. Jason had dropped onto it, sitting on the edge with one leg on the mattress and one on the floor. "Well thank God it's not just me," he said with a little laugh.

"You?"

"Dick, I've been feeling guilty for thinking about you like that since before I _died_ ," Jason said.

"Jason!"

"What? You try going through puberty and seeing Nightwing doing his flexibility routine! I thought it was going to kill me." Jason shook his head. "Didn't go away after I came back, either. Kind of got worse. Figured some wires got crossed in the Pit."

"Oh," Dick said. "I— I had no idea."

"I'm an adult, Dick, it's not like I was going to go panting after you. You don't need that shit. I didn't know either, though. About your. Um. Thoughts."

"Yeah. Well. Same as you, trying to ignore it. I mean, I never was very involved in your life before, then you come back, get your life together, and suddenly I want in? I felt like a creep. I should be trying to help you, work with you, and I do want to, but I also… _want_ you."

Jason was frowning at the floor. He was quiet long enough that Dick started to wonder if he should see himself out. Then he looked up, fixing Dick with the same focused expression he used when he was picking a lock. "You know," he said. "We could _have_ what we want."

"We could?" Dick blinked. Realization unfurled. "We could. That— that is a thing we could have. Since we both want the thing."

"To be clear here," Jason said slowly. "The thing we both want. Is that just sex, or…?"

"It only told you about those fantasies, huh?" Dick said with a sigh. "Jason, sometimes I think about just holding you until we both fall asleep, or being able to grab your hand when I'm happy, or surprising you with your favorite coffee, except I don't know what it is, and I would like to."

"Oh. So. Dating," Jason said.

"Whatever dating means for people like us. If that's something you want," Dick said.

"I think— I think it is." Jason sounded like he'd surprised himself. "Okay, let's. Let's do that, then?"

Dick grinned. "Also the sex, though, to be clear."

"Buy me dinner first, you cad."

"Happily," Dick said, grabbing Jason's hand on impulse and kissing his knuckles. Because he could. "But not in these clothes." He slid off the bed and gathered up the Nightwing suit and accessories. "I'm staying in the penthouse now, right? I should get back there, probably file a report – light on certain details," he assured Jason, who was making a sour face. "Hey, what happened to the demon thing, anyway?"

Jason glanced at the table that held the tools he'd been using for the exorcism. He'd prepared a reliquary for the thing, to make sure it didn't just jump bodies, but the little glass bottle had just shattered, despite the shop owner's assurances that it was exactly what Jason had needed. He was going to have to get his money back.

"I think maybe it went home," he said. There had been a flash of green light, the shattering of glass, and then the thing had streaked toward him. An All-Blade had appeared in Jason's hand and then the thing was so much green pixie dust, falling to the floor and seeming to sink in. "That, or my apartment is now haunted by the ghost of a demon," he said, explaining everything that had happened to Dick. "I'm not sure the All-Blade would have killed it; maybe just the magic that was holding it here. Demons are kind of a gray area, sometimes, depending on the dimension they come from."

"Someone should tell Constantine and Z that. I can't believe they didn't notice I was _possessed_." Dick considered his Nightwing boots and then shrugged and pulled them on. "Oh, well. It happens, I guess. You coming?"

"To the penthouse?"

"Well, I don't have a ride, I'm not really feeling up to swinging across the city, and the penthouse is totally empty and has _very_ soft beds."

"Oh," Jason said. "Yeah, I'm coming."

"Thought you might," Dick said with a grin. He grabbed Jason's hand and pulled him out the door, into their next adventure.

 

**Epilogue:**

 

Jason and Dick were running late for Friday night dinner due to some creative traffic redirection courtesy of Mr. Freeze. They hadn't had time to stop anywhere after handling him, so they just rode directly into the Cave to change there and head upstairs.

"I can't believe you told Mr. Freeze to _chill_ ," Jason said. "He has to have heard that one a million times."

"Yeah, and he was so busy rolling his eyes you got the drop on him. My punning is strategic, babe, I keep telling you."

"Sure, it's not just— hang on, what's that sound?"

They both paused. There was a dull _whirr-thunk-thunk-whirrrrrrrrr-thunk_ coming from the main part of the cave. They exchanged a look, then separated slightly, both edging along a different wall to leave the vehicle bay.

The sound was coming from a clear plexiglass pen that had been set up in the training area. Inside the pen was a robotic vacuum, throwing itself relentlessly against first one wall, then another.

"What the hell?" Jason wondered, emerging from a shadow now that he could see that the threat wasn't much of one.

"Seconded," Dick said.

"Evil Roomba," Tim said, coming from the locker room. Apparently he was running late, too. Probably had something to do with the Penguin issue O had mentioned while Jason and Dick were occupied with Freeze. His eyes were fixed on a tablet as he headed for the stairs. "Someone threw it out a window over on Lake Street a few nights ago just as I happened to be passing by. Seems it picked up a demon." He continued up the stairs, never once looking up, and vanished through the door into Bruce's study.

"Hey, Jay," Dick said.

"Yeah?"

"Lake Street, he said."

"Yeah."

"You think—"

"Probably."

"You know what this means, don't you?"

"We're not adopting a possessed Roomba, Dick."

"But—"

"It took over your body and impersonated you for a _week_ ," Jason pointed out.

"And my apartment has never been so clean."

"That thing is not going anywhere near any of my safehouses."

"Great, I'll keep it then!"

Jason shook his head. "I can't stop you. But we are _not_ having sex anywhere near that thing."

Dick considered. "That's fair. I'll keep it in one of my safe houses, not my actual apartment."

"That's not what I—"

"I can hook it into the security system. This is brilliant."

Jason sighed, knowing when to retreat gracefully. "Okay. Have fun with that. Can we go eat now before Alfred sends a search party?"

Dick grinned, knowing full well that Jason would be helping him design and program a Roomba-based security system before the week was out. He wouldn't be able to resist. Who could? "Yes. Can I kiss you?"

"Yeah, yeah," Jason griped, but the side of his mouth was curving upward, so Dick kissed him right there and it curved even more. Yes, the demon had been an ordeal. But Dick would go through it all again willingly if it meant having this.

 

_A few days later:_

Dick and Jason had stopped at one of Dick's safe houses to patch up and restock after a slightly-more-vigorous-than-anticipated fight. Dick was carefully bandaging a shallow knife slash on Jason's arm and Jason was watching the Roomba (currently on the warpath looking for socks to eat) with deep suspicion when they heard the distinct sound of someone picking the lock on the front door.

Jason stood immediately and Dick followed, balancing on the balls of his feet to ghost over to the door. Jason was only wearing the bottom half of his suit since he'd had to get to his arm, but he still had the domino mask on. Good enough. Dick grabbed an escrima stick and crouched in a ready position against the wall to one side of the door. Jason took up position directly in front of the door, pistol ready, so he'd be the first thing the intruder focused on and Dick could get the drop on them. They watched as the door swung open to reveal—

"Constantine?" Dick asked, straightening.

Constantine was crouched on the floor of the hallway, holding a dowsing rod. Behind Dick, the Roomba trundled past, paying special attention to the one drop of blood that had dripped from Jason's arm onto the floor. The Roomba was very good at blood.

The dowsing rod twitched in Constantine's hand to follow it. Constantine looked from the Roomba, to the shirtless Red Hood, to Nightwing, and back to the Roomba, now returning in the opposite direction while the dowsing rod pointed unerringly at it.

"You know what," Constantine said. "Never mind." He reached into the apartment and pulled the door shut.

 


End file.
